Science ,Technology and Society

Standpoint theorists

Standpoint theorists, and many who are inspired by standpoint theory, not only maintain Dona Haraway's the situated knowledge thesis, conceptualizing all knowledge as perspectival, but also hold a stronger thesis that some of those perspectives are epistemically more valuable than others. In other words, some perspectives offer objectivity in a way that others do not. Although some standpoint theorists argue for a women's standpoint stemming directly from women's experience, most influential standpoint theorists including Hartsock (1983) and Harding (1986) insist that the Marxist-inspired arguments imply that although the feminist standpoint is deeply connected to the lives of women, the epistemically privileged nature of the feminist standpoint stems from active political engagement in the feminist cause, not just the perspective of women. Thus, a certain kind of political activity is required in order to appreciate the situation of women or other oppressed groups.

Goldman, Alvin 2001. "Social Epistemology." The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2001 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = < http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2001/entries/epistemology-social/ >.

This sense of standpoint refers to the capacity to develop "a critical consciousness about the nature of our social location and the difference it makes epistemically" and builds upon, but is distinctive from the situated knowledge thesis that recognizes the importance of social location in shaping epistemic perspective (Wylie 2003, 31). A standpoint does not naturally or automatically arise from a particular social location, although the experiences of an oppressed social location can make the achievement of a standpoint more likely.